- Yes
- No
History: The Cutlass class is the successor to the Scimitar class patrol boats decommissioned in 2022 based of the commercial HPB-1900 boats, this time for military standards. Like their civilian counterparts, the cutlass class would be built by Marine Specialised Technology in Merseyside.
Both were laid down in July 2020. Cutlass was commissioned in May 4th 2022 while Dagger followed suite on the 14th of July of the same year.
Both boats are part of the Gibraltar squadron alongside HMS Trent and 1 Sea class diving support ship. The main role of the Cutlass class is to safeguard and patrol Gibraltar while replacing the Archer and Scimitar class boats previously guarding the area.
In April 2023, Dagger escorted Spanish Descubierta-class corvette Infanta Cristina as she made an illegal transit around Malta (just as the class before her did). Next month of that year, she visited Tangier in Morocco.
In May 2024, Cutlass participated in exercises in Algarve coast along with the Portuguese navy.
In August 2024 Dagger escorted another Spanish vessel making an illegal transit through Gibraltar, this time it was Meteoro class patrol vessel Rayo.
Since 2023, this class holds the tiltle of smallest commissioned Royal Navy vessel, beating out survey vessel HMS Magpie who weighs just two more tons than the Cutlass class.
Specifications:
Displacement:35t
Complement:6 (+ 6 passengers and unknown amount of Walrus quadcopter UAVs)
Armament: 3x 7.62mm general purpose machine guns
Length:19m
Width:4.3m
Engines:3 × Volvo D13 engines (1,000 hp)
Max speed:76km/h
Sources:
https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-latest-activity/news/2024/may/14/20240514-cutlass-algarve